Tension in Bayelsa as police avert bloody

14 candidates back poll cancellation as INEC
weighs options
From Femi Folaranmi, Yenagoa, Bamigbola Gbolagunte,
Akure, Akeeb Alarape & Remi Adefulu
THE police in Bayelsa State yesterday averted a bloody
clash between Peoples Demo Party (PDP) and All
Progressives Congress (APC) supporters over the
cancelled Southern Ijaw poll in the botched December 5
governorship election
The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) on
Monday cancelled the election, citing widespread irregulari­
ties, a decision which was endorsed by 14-candidates.
The electoral body released results of seven of the state’s
eight local governments on Monday.
Thousands of APC supporters yesterday staged a
peaceful protest demanding for the release of Southern
Ijaw results.
The youths who barricaded major roads in the state also
demanded the immediate sack of the Resident Electoral
Commissioner (REC), Mr Baritor Kpagih. PDP youths that
had mobilized for a counter protest were stopped by the
police, appealing to them that it would trigger crisis in the
state.
The youths who chanted solidarity songs said the REC
erred in cancelling an election that had been conducted
with results collated and pasted in various wards.
On sighting the crowd of protesters, security operatives
deployed around INEC premises took their positions while
an Armoured Personnel Carrier (APC) moved towards the
crowd to stop them at the entrance of the road leading to
the office. Policemen with shields barricaded the road.
Leader of the protesters, Mr. Famous Daumenighe, said
the youths had come to deliver a message to the
commission in a peaceful and orderly manner.
Meanwhile, the Bayelsa Restoration Campaign Or­
ganisation ( BYRCO) has condemned the attempt by APC
to instigate crisis which it said could lead to the
declaration of a state of emergency.
The Director of Publicity of the BYRCO of the Peoples
Democratic Party (PDP), Jonathan Obuebite, described the
protesters as “thugs” and “hoodlums,” calling on the
Commissioner of Police and other heads of other security
agencies to take urgent steps to check the protest by APC
members.
In a related development, INEC is weighing its options on
the inconclusive governorship election.
This is even as petitions calling for the cancellation of the
entire election has flooded the national headquarters of
INEC in Abuja.
INEC had released results of seven local government
areas with Governor Henry Seriake Dickson of the PDP
leading former governor Timipre Sylva of APC with 33, 153
votes before Mr Kpagih cancelled the election in Southern
Ijaw.
Investigations revealed that the Bayelsa situation has
thrown INEC into confusion especially with the threat by
the APC to head to court to compel INEC to declare the
result.
Kpagih was said to have been summoned to Abuja after
cancelling the election and he had tabled the reasons for
his decision after consultation with some national
commissioners.
Accordingly, INEC has decided to investigate the election
particularly with the damming verdict by the Transition
Monitoring Group (TMG) which said the poll cannot pass
credibility test.
INEC ad-hoc staff that were deployed in Southern Ijaw
have been invited to write a report on what actually
transpired to help the commission take a final decision on
the issue.
Meanwhile, 14 governorship candidates have backed INEC
over the cancellation of the Southern Ijaw election and its
decision to reschedule it.
The governorship candidates include Prince Oniekpe
(SDP), Brisibe Kpodoh (ADC), Gabriel Tukuwei (ACPN)
Golden Agagaowei (Kowa) Prince Elemah (ID) , Alex Peretu
(PPA), Enu Otonye (PPN) and Edwin Tare (DPP).
The governorship candidates at a news conference
yesterday while declaring that the election in most parts of
the states peaceful, condemned what they called “massive
and monumental fraud, outright rigging and stealing of
electoral materials”
Meanwhile, one of the observer groups in the botched
election, Lawyers in Defence of Democracy, has called for
the immediate probe of the roles of the military and the
police.
Speaking with journalists in Lagos yesterday, Lead
advocate of the group, Mr. Ikechukwu Ikeji, said the probe
had become imperative to unravel the roles played by the
military and the police in the botched election.
He stressed that this would be in line with a similar probe
of the ongoing investigation of the role of the military in
Osun and Ekiti states before the last general election.
“Such investigation must also look at the roles of these
government agencies, including INEC, leading to such
mind-boggling violence as widely reported in the media to
unravel any complicity. Is it not curious that the police
claimed that nobody died while there were pictorial
evidence of several deaths recorded?
Also, the Committee for Democracy and Rights of the
People has called on President Muhammadu Buhari to
remove the INEC Chairman, Prof. Yakubu Mahmud, over
the alleged misconduct of some officials of the
commission in the last governorship elections in Kogi and
Bayelsa states.
The group, in a statement issued by its National Co-
ordinator, Mr Saka Waheed, noted that the activities of
INEC in the recent times were capable of ruining the
country’s democracy.
According to the group “Prof. Mahmud’s first test in Kogi
State as INEC Chairman was messed up and the litigation
that will emanate from the aftermath of Kogi will be unprec­
edented in Nigeria’s electoral history.”